16. Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Sixteen
Asher
“ D o either of you know what she means?” I look between Soren and Phoenix, desperate for understanding. “Has she mentioned a beach to either of you?”
Soren's jaw tightens as he studies her and shakes his head. “She’s said nothing to me.”
Phoenix's brow wrinkles in a troubled frown.
His blue eyes dart between Emma and me, searching for answers neither of us has.
Water drips from his disheveled blond hair as he shakes his head slowly.
He brushes wet hair from Emma's face with gentle fingers.
“What beach, Tough Girl? What safe place are you talking about?”
She grabs his hand, turning glazed eyes on him. “The one…I go to.” Fresh tears spill down her cheeks, mixing with shower spray. “Makes me…free.”
Her face scrunches and she starts to cry, her sobs too big for her body. The sound echoes off the tile walls, a symphony of despair that makes my alpha howl with the need to make it better.
Soren chokes off a strangled sound. “She disassociated.
Her trauma caused her mind to create safe spaces, escape routes.
For Emma, it's a beach. A sanctuary she invented to survive her abuse. A place her mind created when her reality was literally unbearable.” He swallows hard.
“In her current state, she likely didn't know she was entering the pool. She was in her safe place.”
“Fucking godsdammit,” Phoenix breathes, horror evident in his voice.
Soren’s gaze holds the weight of the world. “It means she's more broken than we imagined. This level of dissociation suggests severe psychological trauma beyond even what we suspected.”
“What triggered it?” I’m helpless. Useless. All my training, all my experience with traumatized omegas, and I have no idea how to help our own mate. “Why now? Why tonight?”
Soren shakes his head, at a loss. “Could be multiple factors. Stress of the hearing tomorrow. Physical exhaustion. Unknown environment. Emotional overload. We need a proper psychological evaluation to—”
Emma whimpers, cutting him off. The sound is so pitiful, so lost, that I find myself holding her tighter, trying to shelter her from demons I can't even sense. To my surprise, she burrows her face against my scent gland on the side of my neck, inhaling deeply.
The effect is immediate. Her trembling eases, her crying quiets. But then her scent rises, filling the steamy bathroom with heavenly honeysuckle twined in rich vanilla notes. The unmistakable scent of omega slick hits next, rich and heady, cutting through the steam like a blade.
“Fuck. No wonder she didn’t want us to come into the bedroom. She’s…her body is…starting to work again,” Phoenix brea thes.
Her scent is so thick and sweet it goes straight to my cock. Every muscle in my body tightens, responding to her pheromones on a cellular level.
A deep groan tears from my throat, echoing off the shower walls, raw and hungry.
Emma shivers, a moan falling from her lips.
She twists in my lap, her thighs clenching together as her back starts to bow.
She thrusts her perfect breasts out, her nipples pink and beaded tight.
My mouth waters for a taste. Just one lick that will do nothing to sate the fire inside me.
Need deep and all-consuming flows through me, replacing my blood with misplaced arousal.
The urge to fill, breed, claim is so overwhelming it’s painful. It takes every ounce of control I possess not to give in to these urges, not to let my biology override my ethics because the last thing Emma needs right now is my lust when she’s at her weakest.
Phoenix's breath catches. His pupils blow wide, dark with desire. His hands clench and unclench at his sides as he fights his instincts as his scent billows with the stream rising from the water.
A muscle jumps in Soren’s throat as he swallows hard, fighting the urge to claim written in every line of his body. “We can't let her go through this alone. She’s in pain and she needs us, but this can’t be another basement episode for her. She can’t associate us with them .”
Her sweet scent rushes through me, sending a path of fireworks straight to my balls. My cock is so hard it could cut diamonds and I’m sure my zipper has made permanent marks on the underside. I don’t care how much pain I’m in. That’s irrelevant compared to what she needs from us.
I look down at our broken omega, our mate, this precious creature who'd rather drown than face another alpha in her time of need, yet her face is pressed to my neck, seeking comfort even in her confused state.
“We’re going to help her. Whatever it takes, whatever she needs. We help her through this,” I say, because the last thing she needs is to be left in more pain.
“And if she dissociates again?” Soren rasps.
I tighten my hold on Emma as she snuffles against my neck. There’s nothing we won’t do for this omega. “Then we find a way to make reality better than any escape she can imagine. We become her safe place, or we'll lose her to that beach forever.”
A cry of pain tears from her throat. She clutches her stomach, her nails digging into her skin. Fresh slick coats her thighs as she writhes. She squeezes her eyes shut, tears swelling beneath her lashes. “Alpha.” Her voice is so frail. So small. “Please. Make it stop.”
Witnessing her in this amount of distress makes me sick.
I know what I have to do. What any prime alpha worthy of their scent-matched omega needs to do.
I've been trying to protect her by muting our bond, by holding back the tide of my emotions, but she needs to feel exactly how different we are from Pack Carmichael before we lay a single hand on her.
She needs to feel what a true alpha should feel for their omega, and gods help me, I feel all the fucking feels.
“I'm going to open the bond. Let her feel everything. My remorse, my protection, my...” I swallow hard. “My love.”
Their expressions turn equal parts grim and hopeful as they understand what I'm proposing.
“It could overwhelm her,” Soren warns.
“She needs to know she's not alone anymore.
She needs to understand not all alphas are like the ones she's known. The only way to do that is to be her godsdammed scent-matched alpha. Like I should have been from the start. She knows what it feels like to be abused, but she has no idea how it feels to be loved.” I ghost my fingertips along her delicate jaw, taking in the network of fine veins beneath the surface of her skin.
She's so pale, so translucent, like moonlight given form. Beautiful . “Are you all in?”
“Always,” Phoenix answers immediately, his hand steady on Emma's back. His voice holds pure conviction.
“Whatever she needs.” Soren’s gaze melts into tenderness.
Their hesitant excitement and desperate need bleed into me.
They ache to bond her properly, to complete what fate started when she made her our perfect match.
They're as much her scent-matched mate as I am.
More worthy, perhaps, since they've maintained control while I acted like a rutting animal in that basement.
I'm going to make this right for all of us, even if it sends me to the ends of the seven hells. Emma deserves nothing less than our complete devotion, our absolute protection, our unconditional love.
“Moonbeam,” I murmur, cupping her jaw with gentle fingers. Her skin burns with heat fever under my touch, delicate bones sharp against my palm. “Open your eyes. Look at me.”
Her lashes flutter against cheeks flushed with fever, then lift slowly. Even confused and heat-addled, her omega nature responds to her bonded alpha's command. Her blue eyes, glazed with fever and fear, find mine.
“There you are,” I whisper, and prepare to change everything. To show her what a true bond should feel like. To give her something better than an imaginary beach to escape to.
To become the alpha she deserves, or die trying.
“I want to help you. Would it be okay if I let you feel what's in my heart? Through our bond?”
The question tears at my conscience. She's not in her right mind.
Heat and trauma and desperation have stripped away her defenses.
Asking consent now is dubious at best, manipulative at worst, but watching her suffer, feeling her pain ripple through our connection while I hold back the tide of my own emotions. ..
When she's back in her own mind, when the heat fever breaks and she can think clearly again, I'll shut it all down. Wait for her to choose. But right now, with her body betraying her and her mind seeking escape in drowning, I can only pray this helps.
“Yes, alpha,” she whispers, the words slipping out on pure omega instinct. Her pupils are blown wide, fever-bright, seeking comfort from the only source her biology recognizes. “Please.”
Phoenix's hand tightens on my shoulder. Soren's breath catches. They feel my intention through our pack bond; understand the risk I'm about to take .
I cradle Emma's face between my palms. Taking a deep breath, I begin to lower the walls I've built around our bond.
Slowly. Carefully. Like opening a dam one gate at a time. First, I let her feel my protectiveness, the deep-seated need to stand between her and any threat. Her breath catches as this emotion floods the bond, her fingers tightening on my soaked shirt.
Next comes my remorse, pure and unfiltered. The crushing guilt for claiming her without consent, the self-loathing for becoming what I've fought against but wrapped around that guilt is my absolute dedication to making it right. She gasps, eyes widening as these feelings wash through her.
Then deeper emotions. My awe at her strength, her resilience, her ability to survive hell without losing her core self. My admiration for every small act of defiance, every spark of fight she's maintained. Pride in her courage, even when that courage led her to the pool's depths.
“Alpha,” she breathes, the sound small and wondering.
Deeper still. My joy at finding her, tainted by horror at her condition. My rage at her abusers, tempered by fierce determination to protect. My alpha's recognition of his perfect mate, coupled with the human patience to wait for her trust.
Her pupils dilate as each emotion flows through the bond. Her scent shifts, honeysuckle and vanilla thickening with the female musk of desire.
Finally, I let her feel my love. I send her everything my soft underbelly has to offer her.
I completely open myself to her. I want her to know that what I feel isn’t just alpha instinct or biological drive, but real love, there from the moment I saw her.
For everything I’ve seen since. For her spirit, her heart, her soul.
Love that would wait forever, that would move mountains, that would die for her.
A sob catches in her throat, but it sounds different from her earlier despair. She whimpers, pressing closer to me. “I don't... I can't...”
“Let yourself feel something good,” I murmur.
If this is the only time she’ll allow me to show her how I feel, then so be it, but I want her to know it’s the full truth. I ache for her answering bite, for the completion of our bond that would let her emotions flow back to me. That will be her choice too, when she's ready.
If she's ever ready.
For now, I let her feel my longing, my patient hunger for a true bond.
My thumb traces her bottom lip, and I let her feel how desperately I want to kiss her. Not to claim or possess, but to share comfort, to ease pain, to show her that touch can be gentle. That my touch will always be gentle.
Her scent shifts, her sweetness giving way to musky vanilla deepening with arousal.
Need pools in her eyes, darkening them to midnight blue.
Her fingers thread through my wet hair, tentative at first, then with growing certainty.
She pulls my head down toward her, offering her lips with a trust that makes my heart stutter.
The gesture is pure omega instinct, but the choice is all hers.
I can't think. Can't wait. Can't do anything but accept what she's offering.
My lips meet hers, gentle at first, a bare whisper of contact. When she sighs into the kiss, lips parting slightly, I deepen it. Still careful, still controlled, but pouring everything into the connection.
This is nothing like the claiming bite. This isn't about possession or dominance. This is about showing her how precious she is, how cherished, how much more there is to alpha-omega bonds than what she's known.
Through our bond, I let her feel exactly what this kiss means to me. Let her feel how much I want to worship every inch of her, heal every hurt, kiss away every tear.